The Road to Understanding
by albentecaelo
Summary: Their friendship was definitely something new and unique. However, sudden encounter with weird stranger raised some questions for Hiccup. Moreover following events proved to be quite a problem. Now Hiccup and Toothless need to find the way to get everything back to normal. Set after first movie during Dragons: Riders of Berk


_**Hi, everybody! It's my first attempt in fanfiction, besides, English is not my native language, so, please, bear me and my not-so-perfect grammar. In any case, I don't know what else I have to say.**_

_**Disclaimer: I don't own anything. **_

…Without any doubts flight was true embodiment of freedom. The endless blue sky, the white milky clouds, the breeze rustling his hair, not to mention the great view – everything was so amazing, so unique. Sometimes Hiccup really wondered how he lived before without all those flights with Toothless.

In any case, for a moment, the teen couldn't imagine his life without the dragon. Their friendship surely had opened new horizons.

Everything was changing now, after defeat of Red Death. Three hundred years of never-ending conflict between Vikings and dragons were really tough, but now it had ended. Of course, it wasn't easy to forget all those cruel fights and dragon raids and their aftermath. It was even more difficult to learn some acceptance, yet everybody tried really hard, so Berk was slowly changing.

Hiccup smiled. Somehow he, the worst Viking in his generation, had caused that great change. It surely sounded ironical or, maybe, unbelievable.

Moreover, Berk wasn't only thing that was changing. Hiccup couldn't deny that his relationships were affected as well. Not only he had befriended a dragon, he had also become friends with other teens. Besides, his secret crush Astrid had actually acknowledged him (well, maybe even more, yet Hiccup still had some doubts). And of course, his father, Stoick the Vast at last was proud of his son.

It never ceased to amaze Hiccup how his fate played with him. Were all those random, unpredictable leaps a challenge from gods? Or maybe some jokes? For nearly all his life Hiccup was known as The Useless, a shame to his father. Then he learned some useful facts about dragon and suddenly had become the best in dragon training, beating even genius like Astrid. His secret was discovered eventually, and Hiccup had fallen again in everybody's opinion as he seemed to be a traitor to entire Berk. But in the end, the teen had been labeled as a hero. Human opinion was surely a weird thing.

Hiccup looked at the sky. The evening was drawing on, and it was gradually turning red. The time surely flew by.

"So what, bud? Going home?" asked the teen. Toothless huffed. He definitely would like to fly more and Hiccup clearly understood his dismay.

"I know, I know," sighed the teen. "It's great to fly, but it's getting late… I promise, we'll fly more tomorrow".

Toothless turned his head back and looked at him pleadingly.

"OK. One more lap," agreed Hiccup. After all, he enjoyed the flights as much as Toothless. In truth, he even felt more comfortable in the air. Maybe, it was because of prosthetic, maybe, not. He was kind of clumsy even with both legs.

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Hiccup sighed watching the sunset from the cliff. Toothless was sitting near him. Somehow 'one more lap' had become several laps and then they landed on that cliff. Still Hiccup couldn't miss watching a sunset. It was always a marvelous and calming sight. Besides, it seemed that Toothless liked it as well.

"What a wonderful, yet weird friendship," a calm male voice broke the silence. Both the boy and the dragon turned around only to find the stranger sitting on the stone. Toothless growled menacingly. Hiccup was simply surprised.

'Has he been sitting there all the time? And we haven't noticed?" the teen thought in bewilderment. Well, he couldn't be so sure about himself, but Toothless had much better senses, yet also failed to notice the stranger.

The male seemed weird at least. It was nearly impossible to tell his age from his looks. Besides, while the most Vikings were large and bulky, the stranger wasn't too tall or muscular. He had a fiery red hair. Well, the red hair wasn't very uncommon on the Berk, yet that colour was definitely unusual. It was nearly like flame. Hiccup was sure he had never seen that person before.

"Greetings, young man," sang the stranger. Now Hiccup was totally convinced that the man wasn't from Berk. Even before the encounter with Red Death, every Berkian knew infamous chief's son, who seemed to have a talent to cause more destruction than some dragons.

"Hello," answered the teen, still doubting how to treat the male. Toothless, on other hand, continued growling.

"What's up, bud?" Hiccup tried to calm the dragon. It was strange. While Toothless never trusted complete strangers, he never reacted so aggressively without any reason. The man hadn't tried to attack or provoke the dragon, he even didn't have any weapon, yet Toothless still refused to calm down.

And Hiccup suddenly understood the reason. The man's eyes were really dark, besides there was something in them… No, nothing evil or cruel. It was more like the stranger didn't know the difference between good and evil at all. Moreover, his overconfident smirk was simply unpleasant.

"It's quite an achievement to befriend a legendary Night Fury, I must say," said the stranger thoughtfully, suddenly approaching Toothless. Before Hiccup managed to react, the man tapped the dragon's snout. That was definitely bad move. If the stranger hadn't taken away his hand, he would surely lost it. Dragons were extremely prideful. Something like that could enrage even a peaceful and calm dragon, let alone irritated like Toothless. Well, Hiccup was sure that he himself could tap Toothless playfully without any consequences, but they were good friends.

"Hey, what are you?.." began the teen angrily. He barely managed to hold the dragon.

However, the stranger didn't seem to listen to him at all. It was more like he was speaking to himself:

"Really, what an unusual friendship… I may say, even somehow one-sided…"

"One-sided?" asked Hiccup with frown.

"Or maybe, not equal," shrugged the man nonchalantly.

"Why do you think so?" now the teen began to get angry. Was that man questioning his friendship with Toothless?

"Well," chuckled the stranger with some unreadable expression in his eyes. "Let me ask you. Does he understand you? I mean all your words".

"That's…" Hiccup really wanted to give an affirmative answer, yet… Toothless was really smart, but the teen seriously doubted he understood everything he said.

"Another question," continued the man. "Do you understand him?"

That was even worse. Of course, Hiccup knew he didn't understand what Toothless was going to say to him. Well, the teen had learned to read the dragon's mood and sometimes managed to guess his thoughts, but nothing more.

"It doesn't make our friendship less truthful," said Hiccup instead of answer. Toothless squinted and growled once more.

"Still there will be always some barrier between you," sang the man nearly gloatingly.

Hiccup turned away: he simply wasn't eager to look into stranger's eyes.

"So what? I wish I could understand Toothless. I know I can't. But at least, I can try," he said with determination and turned around.

The stranger was nowhere to see as if he vanished into thin air. Hiccup looked at Toothless, who seemed as confused as himself.

"Great, now that guy has vanished," murmured the teen. The dragon sniffed the air suspiciously, yet didn't find anything.

"Let's talk about your behavior, you useless reptile," began Hiccup. "What was that? I know, that guy was annoying. He irritated even me. Yet it's not the reason to try to attack him…"

Toothless looked at the teen sheepishly. Hiccup sighed:

"Why do I have a feeling that you haven't understand even a half of what I've said?"

The stranger may have vanished, but his poisonous words still remained…


End file.
